shaky hands, warm hearts
by ipsa dixit
Summary: harry, lily luna, and meeting family


_prompts at the bottom_

 _thanks to ck for the quick beta and seeing me through to the very end of this!_

 _1580 words, by gdocs_

* * *

Harry's hands shake as he turns the page of his book. He immediately flips back to that page and his eyes crawl back up to the line he read before.

It's a hallucination, right? Maybe he needs new glasses…

"Harry?"

Harry whips around, ripping his eyes away from the book. Ginny's standing there, their two-year-old daughter attached to her hip.

"Hi, Gin," he says, smiling. He stands up, grabbing Lily away from Ginny and twirling her around. "I was just doing some reading," he tells her, bopping Lily on the nose. She looks over at his book, a smirk on her face and one eyebrow raised.

"The Muggle phone book?"

Harry picks up the book with one hand, holding his place with his thumb.

"I just needed _some_ time alone from them," he explains, jerking his head towards Lily, who's playing with his hair. "I wanted to read."

"So you read the phone book," Ginny says, smirking at him. Harry sighs, putting Lily down on the floor.

"James wouldn't leave me alone unless he saw me actually reading a book like I told him I wanted to do. This was the closest book," Harry says opening the book once again, his eyes snapping back to _that_ name.

"You didn't have to actually read it," Ginny points out, moving closer to Harry to look at what he was looking at. He ignores her point and instead points to the single name that stuck out to him.

"Look at that," he says, a lump already forming in his throat. Ginny peers down and then snaps her head back up, looking into Harry's eyes.

"Harry —"

"I know," he replies, cutting her off. He knows that they're both thinking the same thing, but he doesn't want to say it out loud — what if it's some trick and he breaks the illusion by speaking about it. Still, he _needs_ to make sure he's seeing it right. "Isla _Evans_."

…

Harry's hands shake as he ties up his shoelaces. He hasn't been sure about a lot of things in his life, but he's _definitely_ not sure about this.

"You sure about this?" Ginny asks, Lily on her hip. Lily looks at Harry with her brows, as if she disapproves of him leaving the house. Harry looks up at Ginny, his eyebrows raised.

"Not at all," he admits. He straightens up and dusts off an invisible piece of lint from his pants just so his hands are doing something — maybe that'd stop them from shaking. "But I have to try," he adds. "She's my family. Probably."

Ginny frowns at him as if she's deciding on how to make him stay. Finally, she just sighs.

"You're right," she says, nodding her head. She walks him to the door and he wrenches it open but turns back to look at Ginny.

"I'll see you later," he says, leaning in to peck her on the lips. She just raises her eyebrows at him when he pulls away.

"Come with?" Lily says from Ginny's arms, leaning towards Harry. He smiles at her.

"No, you're going to stay here with your mummy and brothers," he tells her, kissing the top of her head.

"Come with," she repeats, sounding more determined than before.

"No, you're going to —" Harry begins, before being cut off by Lily wailing.

"Wanna go with!" she says, looking at him with a pout. Harry looks at Ginny, pleading for help with his eyes. The train he needs to take to Isla Evans' address leaves at ten. He needs to _go_.

"I think she wants to come with," Ginny says, smirking. Harry rolls his eyes and looks back at Lily as she lets out another wail. There are no tears coming out of her eyes and Harry _knows_ that she's manipulating him already, but she gives him another pout.

"You can come with," he says, reaching out his hands for her.

…

Harry's hand shakes as he knocks on the door, Lily in his other hand. He waits for a moment or two before the door swings open, a little old lady standing there and peering up at him. There are wisps of red in her grey shock of hair and her eyes match the same ones Harry sees when he looks in a mirror — startlingly emerald. Something about her makes Harry stand a little bit taller.

"I'm Harry," he says to her, shifting in his spot. "Harry Potter." Her expression doesn't change. "Lily Evan's son. I thought that maybe you —"

"You're Lily's son?" the woman asks, still peering at him. " _My_ Lily?"

"Your —" Harry starts, his heart pounding. Does that mean —? "Are you Lily's Mum?" he asks. His heart hammers against his ribcage, threatening to burst out.

"Yes," the lady says softly. Something inside of Harry bursts in anger. He has a grandmother? And she never bothered to _find him_? He had assumed that his grandparents were dead — Dumbledore surely would have left him with his grandparents if he had any. "You should come in," the old lady — his _grandmother_ — says. He follows her into the house, shifting Lily onto his other arm.

She shuffles into the kitchen, filling up a kettle and putting it on the stove.

"Tea?" she asks, getting cups out of the cupboard as if Harry's already answered a yes. He keeps his mouth shut. He has so many questions to ask, he just doesn't know where to begin. "The war is over, then?" she asks as she tends to the stove's fire.

"What?" Harry asks. He's not sure he heard her right. This old Muggle lady knows about the war? Well, she must have; her daughter fought in it.

"Lily wrote to us, years ago, saying that she —" The woman hesitates, not looking at Harry, instead all of her focus on the stovetop. "That she couldn't talk to us anymore because it'd be dangerous for us to communicate with her during the war. If you're here, the war must be over, right?"

Harry can see her hands shake while handing the kettle. He should probably offer to help, but her question has caused a lump to grow in his throat. His mother cut off communication with her mother to protect her? Harry doesn't think he'd be able to do that. Suddenly, he doesn't feel like much of a Gryffindor.

"Yes," he answers simply, finding his voice again. He doesn't bother to tell her that the war she's talking about was nearly thirty years ago and in that time another war started and ended. There'll hopefully be more time to tell her that, if she wants to hear it.

"Where's Lily, then? I thought she would come and see me," Harry's grandmother says, turning back around to face him. There's sadness etched into her face and Harry feels another burst of anger — this time at his own mother. How could she just leave this woman all alone?

"She —" Harry says, his voice getting caught in his throat. He clears it and tries to speak again, but no words come out.

"I'm Lily!" Lily shrieks from Harry's arm. Her fingers have been in Harry's hair for the entire meeting, but she withdraws them now, putting them in the air with a big smile.

"This is Lily," Harry says, his voice rough. How is he supposed to break to his grandmother that her daughter is _dead_?

"Is that your daughter?" his grandmother says, looking over at Lily with a soft smile. Lily reaches out her hands to her and Harry puts her down, letting her walk over to his grandmother. Lily's scooped up and Harry watches his grandmother coo at her as if she was born to take care of babies.

"Yeah," he says. "My daughter. She's named after my mum."

Harry lets that sentence settle in the air for a moment and his grandmother freezes, her age showing on her face.

"She's named after Lily?" she repeats slowly.

"My mum didn't —" Harry starts, his voice cracking. It's as if the wound on his forehead is brand new as if his mother died just yesterday. "My mum isn't — My mum didn't —" He can't get the words out.

His grandmother sighs and Harry knows that she knows what he means. His heart cracks at the exhausted expression on her face. This shouldn't have to happen.

"I'm sorry," Harry whispers. He's unable to look his grandmother in the face anymore, so he instead looks at Lily, who has taken to playing with her great-grandmother's hair. Harry hopes that his grandmother doesn't mind sticky fingers in her hair; Lily had a tendency to get into endless messes.

"Harry?" his grandmother says as if trying it out on her own tongue. He makes himself look back at her.

"Yes?" he says with a little cough.

"Lily named you after my late husband Harry, I believe," she says absentmindedly, looking down at Lily. Something warm blooms in Harry's heart. He never knew that. He didn't know his grandfather — or his mother, even — but this makes him feel closer to both. After a moment, his grandmother looks back up at him. "I will miss my Lily forever," she says, her eyes sad, "but I'm glad I get to meet you. I'd like to know you better. There's a lot of time we missed out on."

The warm feeling grows, encasing Harry's heart.

"I'd love that."

* * *

 _for:_

 _the houses competition [gryffindor, bonus round 3, theme:_ _first time experiencing something, prompt: meeting_ _a long-lost family member]_


End file.
